The Museum of Russian Art is pleased to present

“Art … must be spread everywhere.” (V. Mayakovsky) – An Introduction to Russian Constructivism

A Presentation by Sandra Teitge

Tuesday, February 7th, 2017  |   6:30 – 7:30pm (Doors will open at 6:00pm)

General Admission $15  |  TMORA Members $12  |  Students (with ID) $7

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Reflecting the goals of Russian Constructivism influential avant-garde poet and playwright Vladimir Mayakovsky demanded that “art must not be concentrated in dead shrines called museums. lt must be spread everywhere – on the streets, in the trams, factories, workshops, and in the workers’ homes.”

The seed of Russian Constructivism (1913 – 1940s), a movement created by the Russian avant-garde, was a desire to express the experience of modern life, its dynamism, its new and disorientating qualities of space and time. But also crucial was the desire to develop a new form of art more appropriate to the democratic and modernizing goals of the Russian Revolution. Constructivists were to be constructors of a new society – cultural workers on par with scientists in their search for solutions to modern problems.

Unlike in France or Germany, where the avant-garde art development was backed up and encouraged by various philosophical, aesthetic and psychological theories, in Russia it was prompted by the pre-revolutionary atmosphere and the activities of patrons of art and enthusiasts who steered the national art life into the tide of European culture.

ABOUT THE PRESENTER

Sandra Teitge is a East Berlin-born New York-based independent curator/programmer, writer, and researcher and artistic director of the residency program FD13 in Saint Paul, MN/U.S.  She organizes discursive events and exhibitions in the realm of contemporary art and is interested in creating time-based situations, which focus on dialogue, knowledge exchange, and the body.

Recent curatorial projects include a procession in Puerto Rico with the artist Papo Colo (MoMA PS1), research in the framework of culinary politics in Beirut/Lebanon and Munich/Germany, the WorldWide Storefront organized by the Storefront for Art & Architecture New York, the all-night performative exhibition Vexations at the Northrop Auditorium in Minneapolis, the Pavilion of Georgia at the 55th Biennale di Venezia, and the 7th Berlin Biennale for Contemporary Art.

Sandra regularly writes for diverse (maga)zines and contributed to the publication Metropolitan Views II. Art Scenes in Berlin 1989-2009. She studied Art & Visual History (MA) in Berlin and Media Studies and French (BA) at the University of Sussex in Brighton, UK, and at the Nouvelle Sorbonne in Paris, France.

Besides her curatorial activities, Sandra teaches Art Theory & History at different colleges.

This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a Minnesota State Arts Board Operating Support grant, thanks to a legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund, and a grant from the Wells Fargo Foundation.